Southeast Asia Travel News

The rarely visited Angkorian temple site of Prasat Kuk Roka forms a regular break on our overland trip from Phnom Penh to Siem Reap. It’s a small, albeit intact, sandstone tower – probably dating to the 11th century – and a minnow compares to what awaits at Angkor. However, it does illustrate a lot of features which will be seen…

Costing the Apopo organisation around 6,000 Euros each, including training and importation, these are certainly the world’s most expensive rodents yet when you see the giant African rats – or Gambian pouched rats to be precise, Cricetomys gambianus – in action, you’ll understand why. Easier to maintain and handle than trained dogs (and much lighter so less likely to set…

An isolated and very rarely visited ruined Angkor period temple site, Prasart Kok Roka in Cambodia’s Kompong Thom Province is famous, well locally at least, for being the area’s very own leaning tower. According to some locals, the depression in the ground in front of the temple is rumoured to be a bomb crater which supposedly tilted the tower to…

Cambodia – much more than Angkor Wat! Sure, Angkor Wat, Bayon and the temples of Siem Reap are the highlights for most visitors to Cambodia but there’s plenty of other fascinating sights architecture-wise to be seen in the kingdom. The country’s rich architectural heritage indeed covers everything from the recent and French period to Funanese and pre-Angkor sites. Here are…

Siem Reap’s Psa Chas, or Old Market, with its souvenir stalls, packaged herbs and spices and tourist-friendly cafes is well known amongst visitors to Cambodia yet the similarly named Psa Chas Phnom Penh is rarely included on anyone’s city itineraries even though it’s centrally and conveniently located on 13th Street close to both the riverfront and Wat Phnom. There are…

Prasart Ta Prom, at UNESCO World Heritage-listed Angkor. Cambodia’s famous, so-called, ‘Tomb Raider Temple’ with its giant trees and sprawling roots is certainly one of the vast Angkor complex’s most famous and photogenic sites and so consequently, it does see a lot of visitors and in the high season particularly can get rather busy. A regular, classic itinerary would have…

Banteay Kdei Temple in the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Angkor complex is not generally considered one of the ‘major’ Angkor temples and is thus skipped by many visitors and tour groups, though one of its major attractions and, why we think it’s well worth including in any temple itinerary, is precisely because much of the time you’ll have the temple almost…

Giant gnarled trees rise from huge piles of sandstone blocks; spreading roots and sprawling vines cloak massive walls, dense foliage obscures crumbling towers and moss and lichen conceal intricate carvings. Cambodia’s Beng Melea; chaotic, decaying ancient ruins and rampant tropical vegetation is a perfect synthesis of man’s handiwork and untamed nature yet, ultimate[y, a complete antithesis of what it was…

A few unusual images of Buddhist monks during a ceremony at the partially-ruined, but still active, shrine Wat Preah Ang Kok Thlok.  Originally an Angkor-period temple the Wat is located just opposite the southwest corner of Bayon Temple at Angkor and we just stopped in as an afterthought on our way back to the car-park after our Bayon visit. A…

A bit rushed today -no time to write a blog post – so we’ll fall back on a few classic dawn at Angkor Wat pictures, which you can never have too many of (can you)? Must have watched the dawn rise over the famous silhouette at least 30 times but it never gets boring! Different time of year, different weather,…

Another excellent and interesting Cambodian overland trip yesterday – the road to Siem Reap in western Cambodia from the cpaital Phnom Penh. First stop was Skuon for the always popular deep-fried ‘tarantulas’. Popular photo subject that is – not always such a popular snack and this time the fried crickets won out over the spiders hands down. Problem with the…

Must have visited the ruined Ta Nei Temple some 20 times and am yet to see another visitor there! Moreover, it’s a great little Jayavarman VII site in a picturesque forest setting with some interesting carvings remaining. There’s no road to this temple making it, along with Banteay Tom, one of the rare reasonably-sized Angkor sites that you can’t actually…

Whilst the ‘main’ temples of the UNESCO-listed World Heritage Park are now relatively well looked after there are still thousands of smaller, rarely visited Angkor temples that dot the Cambodian countryside from the suburbs of Phnom Penh to the Lao border, north to the Dandrek Escarpment and south to the cave temples of Kampot. Many of these sites may be…